The traditional electrical power grid is evolving into a smart grid. Smart grid integrates the traditional electrical power grid with information and communication technologies. Such integration empowers the electrical utilities providers and consumers, improves the efficiency and the availability of the power system while constantly monitoring, controlling and managing the demands of customers. A smart grid is a complex network composed of millions of devices and entities including substations, transformers, voltage regulators, switches, meters and other equipment connected on a network. Such a massive network comes with many security concerns and vulnerabilities.
A smart grid network includes many components and most of them are located in remote premises that are usually unattended which makes them vulnerable to physical access. Additionally the network used for communication between devices on the smart grid may have limited data capacity.
A security system is needed that provides security of any premises on the smart grid making use of the communication network already deployed to reach devices on the grid.